At the end of every day, after teeth have been brushed and stories have been read, there’s a tickle fight. I wiggle my fingers between their ribs and into the soft skin of their bellies and they shriek and kick, finally collapsing in a fit of laughter. When they do, I feel their weight on me, the cozy comfort of their fuzzy PJs; I smell the strawberry shampoo in their hair and see the tiny freckles spattered across their cheekbones. They are etched into my memory, these moments and these girls, like the words on a tombstone. Eternally.

But what will they remember? That they used to be very ticklish, or that they never wanted to go to sleep? Or maybe none of it at all? Maybe all of these hours and days together will grow fuzzy at the edges, seeping over and into one another leaving them with only a general recollection of, I hope, happiness.

I spend so many of my days running through the routine, the weeks on the calendar scribbled over with PAC meetings and soccer practices, dance recitals and doctors’ appointments. But I’m far enough into this journey now to recognize, most of the time, those fleeting seconds that are important; the ones that are particularly lovely or even bittersweet. l feel the need to hold on to those moments, to collect them, to gather them up and look them over and to tell myself, Don’t ever forget this.

My girls, though, have barely begun. They don’t have much to look back on and aren’t too bothered by what may lie ahead. They are always in the present, living each minute as it comes and then, when it passes, immersing themselves in the next one.

Looking back on my own childhood, I can still pause on certain, unexpected frames: The day my mom surprised me with a coveted pink jean jacket; the green milkshake she made before school on St. Patrick’s Day; the treat of maple-iced donuts after rainy soccer games; the long, hot drive to a summer vacation, all five of us and the car-sick dog crammed into a tiny compact Honda.

What will stay in focus for my two girls? I hope it’s the afternoons spent climbing the rocky shoreline in search of starfish and not that time I slammed the door and made them cry. And even if years and years from now they can’t recall squealing in fits of ticklish laughter, I hope they at least remember – more than that, I hope it sticks to their bones and takes root in their hearts – that feeling, that absolute inevitability, of being loved.

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I feel the EXACT same way. This is beautifully said. I want to push pause. They are perfect I wish I could remember every minute. All of them! I wish they could too

lia

I keep asking myself that. My son is 4 and I storytell him lovely moments from our common past, so that they stay with him. I hope he remembers how we once put boots and marched through every puddle in our street, or how we go for ice cream, just the two of us, in a fancy little bistrot and we sit on the high bar stools. Or how we go tractor spotting at his dad’s village or how he learned to swim in the sea. Since I’ve had him, I have been surprised to see that I always recall my mom asking for chores or insisting on manners, while I remember my dad to be the playfull and exciting one – I know that we had playtime with my mom and that my dad was the one to spank us, and yet it was their general disposition at parenting that has staid with me, and it is true: my mom is more focused on what has to be done, my dad is always focused on how life is enjoyable.
So I play a lot with my son, hoping he will remember all these sweet moments far more than my insisting on him putting his toys away. Well, time will show…

Danny’s Momma

My son lost his first tooth the other day. He’s 5. Although I tried to prepare him for it, it still freaked him out a little bit. He looked like he wanted to cry, so I told him the story of when I lost my first tooth, about how I was on the school bus, the same age as him, and when I stood up to get in line with all the other kids to get off the bus my tooth came out, and I pushed my way to the front of the line, squeezing past all of the kids saying “Bus Driver! Help!” over and over. My son asked “then what happened?” and I realized, I had no idea. Literally the only part I remembered was what I had told him. I don’t remember how much I got from from the tooth fairy or telling my mom about it when I got home. I just remeber being scared, and that made me sad.

I know he’s not going to remember EVERYTHING, but I try hard to make sure he has plenty of good memories, like jumping through the puddles with mommy, or playing hide and seek with flashlights in the house with both mommy and daddy. That way he’s sure to remember at least one fun thing.

AS

#2 – That is the best way. I hope to tell a lot of stories and show pictures. Memories fade and retelling helps keep them strong. I’m hoping to start a journal now that my daughter is to an age where she is actually doing stuff to help me remember so I can tell the stories!

HappyHippie

We have our tv set up to work as a giant digital photo album, so our kids see pictures of all the cool stuff we’ve done nearly every day. It’s amazing how much it’s helped them to really remember these times. They want to talk about the pictures all the time and we talk about things that happened before and after the pictures too: who was there, what the day was like, what we were thinking and feeling at the time. I’m blown away by the level of detail my kids remember and hope these precious times are firmly cemented in their little minds.

Momof4

I often wonder this myself. I get in trouble because of it. Why? because I want my kids to remember the time I spent with them because I did that more often than whats expected of me. I put off some cleaning and organizing things to spend time with my kids. I want them to remember I put them first, not a clean house. But in the end they remember what they remember, and it’s not always the same thing we do.

Hot Topic

Note: This is a fun post spoofing a popular series on one of my favorite technology blogs. The boy scouts have a motto “always be prepared.” My son doesn’t know that because he is 3. But he does like to be prepared in case an adventure (or a 30-minute ride to his grandparents house) presents… Read more »